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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 




GERALDINE AND PETER ON THE RIVER BANK 



RIVER- 

A Story for 


LAND 

Children 


by 
ROBERT W. CHAMBERS 

AUTHOR OF 

" OUTDOORLAND " " ORCHARD-LAND " 

"CARDIGAN" ETC. 

ILLUSTRATED IN COLOR BY 
ELIZABETH SHIPPEN GREEN 


NEW YORK AND LONDON 

HARPER £r BROTHERS PUBLISHERS 

1904 



SEP 22 1904 

rht Entry 



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COPY B 






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Copyright, 1904, by Robert W. Chambers. 

All rights reserved. 
Published September, 1904. 



TO 

PENELOPE SEARS 



TO 
PENELOPE, DANCING 



Through the ruddy ember-glow 
Little feet retreat, advance, 
Tripping in a shadow-dance. 

Laughing eyes that glance askance, 
Whirling curls and skirts that flow, 

Courting in a noiseless dance 
Shadows swaying to and fro ; 
Time enough for you to know 

Why the shades of Fate and Chance 

Mingle in your shadow-dance. 

Time enough for you to know 
When the phantom of romance, 

Gliding through the ember-glow, 
Faces you in contre-dance ! 

Flying curls that float and flow, 

Laughing eyes that glance askance, 
Time enough for you to know. 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER 



I. The Yellow Butterfly . 

II. Sindbad the Grasshopper 

III. Pete Tip-up 

IV. The Marsh-hawk . 

V. In River-land . 

VI. The Outlaw . . 

VII. The Wood-duck . 



PAGE 

I 

17 

30 

41 
51 

68 
81 



ILLUSTRATIONS 



Geraldine and Peter on the river-bank Frontispiece ^ 

" 'Why, it is a whole garden of solid 

yellow butterflies !' cried Peter " . Facing p. 8 

"' They call me Sindbad the Grass- 
hopper' . . . . . 2 2 

" ' Oh, Mrs. Pete, it is the most won- 
derful nest I ever saw !' ' . . 38 v 

" The hawk soared upward, balanced 

on broad, grayish wings ' . . 42 

" ' Why, we're chasing all kinds of 
tiny water creatures/ said the 
whirligig'' .... 56 

" ' Are there any harmless mos- 
quitoes ?' asked Peter, quietly " 70 

" ' We wood-ducks are experts in the 

water' . . . . " 86 




RIVER-LAND 



THE YELLOW BUTTERFLY 



GERALDINE and Peter, noses flattened 
against the window-pane, listened to the 
breezy swish ! swish ! of the summer rain along 
the wet veranda. And while they listened 

i 



RIVER-LAND 

they recited in a discouraged whisper this re- 
markable poem : 

" Water wet, dust dry, 
Land low, sky high, 
Sun shine by-and-by; 
Raia, rain, go away, 
Come again another day, 
Farmers wait to make the hay!" 

"Oh, Peter !" sighed Geraldine, "don't you 
think we've said it enough ?" 

"Keep it up," said Peter, hopefully; "the 
rain is sure to stop if we only talk enough." 

" But my mouth is tired," whimpered Ger- 
aldine. 

"Well, then," said Peter, "we won't repeat 
the poem until your mouth is rested, but we'll 
think it as hard as we can. Now, when you're 
ready to think that poem, just nod your head." 

Geraldine looked out at the rain, her brows 
puckered, her blue eyes steadily fixed. Pres- 
ently she nodded, earnestly. 

2 



RIVER-LAND 

The roar of the rain on roof and window 
filled the silence for a while, then, little by 
little, the silvery downpour slackened. 

" I told you so !" said Peter, excitedly. 
" Now let's think like fury, Geraldine !" 

A robin, gray wings spread, came sailing 
past the window and alighted on the wet lawn. 
Another arrived, dropping into the grass with 
a flirt of his tail and a cheery outburst of 
chirping. Then, singly and in pairs, the wild 
birds came winging to the lawn ; robins, heads 
high, taking short little runs through the soak- 
ing clover ; bronze grackles stalking to and 
fro, pale-yellow eyes staring about for insects ; 
bluebirds softly fluttering and singing as they 
drifted from fence to fence like big, azure-tinted 
moths; golden -winged woodpeckers, chipping 
sparrows, even a shy, slate -colored cat -bird 
mewing in the pear-tree on the terrace, and 
making short dashes in pursuit of little winged 
things that fluttered in the dripping hedge. 

3 



RIVER-LAND 

A moment later the sun broke out through 
the rain, dissolving it to a golden fog, through 
which the pines on the hill shimmered like the 
pearl-tinted spires of fairyland. 

"We've done it! Three cheers for us!" 
cried Peter, scrambling hastily down from the 
window - seat. Geraldine slid to the floor, 
cheering excitedly. 

" We thank ourselves," said Peter, with a 
low bow, " for this unexpected and flatter- 
ing applause. Courtesy to yourself, Geral- 
dine." 

Geraldine courtesied to herself three times, 
laying her small hand on her heart, and mov- 
ing her lips in modest acknowledgment of the 
compliment. 

Then they raced to the library door. "Moth- 
er !" they said, in the same breath, "may we 
go out and play ?" 

Their mother looked up with a smile and 
nodded, and away they flew with a gay shout, 

4 



RIVER-LAND 

their parting cry floating back through the 
open door — 

" Thank you, mother dear !" 

Across the lawn sunlight fell ; shrubbery 
and hedge brightened, and a million tender 
leaves twinkled as the south wind stirred them. 
The children crossed the garden where wet 
roses and half-closed lilies hung powdered with 
sparkling spray, where in hollyhock and lark- 
spur, bent and weighted heavily, wet bumble- 
bees buzzed, drying their gossamer wings in 
the sun. 

Long ago in Outdoor-land the children had 
learned that the world loved them ; long ago 
they had learned to understand the tiny voices 
chorusing from grass and thicket and leafy 
branch. They heard the great golden-banded 
bees grumbling to the little brown bees about 
their wet and mussy wings ; they heard the 
ants in the grass calling to one another, 
" Hasten ! hasten ! The rain has flattened out 

5 



RIVER-LAND 

our little hills and there are a thousand things 
to be done before sunset !" 

They heard the great green caterpillar crunch- 
ing away at the woodbine leaves on the trellis ; 
they heard a fat garden-toad, who had jumped 
for a fly and missed it, panting, " Oh my ! oh 
my! How vexing to be jeered at by a fly!" 
And they heard the fly buzzing with laughter. 

Yellow butterflies were flying across the lawn 
in twos and threes, darting hither and thither, 
and whenever two butterflies passed, the chil- 
dren heard their tiny voices calling one to an- 
other, " Meet me at the puddle ! Meet me at 
the puddle !" 

" Suppose we go, too," said Peter. 

" Where?" asked Geraldine. 

"To the puddle where all the yellow butter- 
flies are going. There must be something curi- 
ous going on there." And he called out to a 
hurrying yellow butterfly, "Where is the pud- 
dle you all are going to ?" 

6 



RIVER-LAND 

" On the river-road, " answered the tiny voice. 

" Is it very muddy ?" inquired Geraldine, as 
another yellow butterfly darted off at a tangent 
and came fluttering around her face. 

" Muddy ? I should say so. It is delicious- 
ly muddy with the very muddiest kind of mud. 
Don't miss it, children. There '11 be a brilliant 
assembly there after this rain." 

" But where is it ?" asked Peter, as the yel- 
low butterfly fluttered off. 

"You can't miss it !" called back the butter- 
fly ; " it's a puddle full of the muddiest kind of 
mud and the wettest kind of wet. Au revoir !" 
In a moment more he became a twinkling speck 
of gilt across the sunny meadow. As the chil- 
dren followed, through thickets of mint and 
bergamot and fresh sweet grasses, soaked to 
the knees, scores of butterflies passed them, all 
hurrying to the trysting-place, and the air rang 
with little voices all calling: "Meet me at the 
puddle ! Meet me at the puddle !" 

7 



RIVER-LAND 

The soft summer wind dried the children's 
wet stockings and shoes as they ran along the 
sunny lane which led down to the river-road ; 
and very soon they saw the river flowing be- 
tween green banks over which willow and alder 
bent, and slender branches dipped in the brim- 
ming current. 

" Gracious !" exclaimed Geraldine, as they 
came into the road. " Did you ever see so many 
yellow butterflies in all your life !" 

The road ahead was thick with yellow but- 
terflies rising, drifting, fluttering, settling again 
around a great bright yellow patch which lay 
in the middle of the road like a circle of yellow 
blossoms. 

"What is that yellow spot ?" asked Geral- 
dine. 

"Why, it is a whole garden of solid yel- 
low butterflies !" cried Peter, in amazement. 
And it was. Hundreds and hundreds of brill- 
iant primrose wings tufted the mud ; above, a 

8 




WHY, IT IS A WHOLE GARDEN OF SOLID YELLOW BUTTERFLIES!' CRIED PETER 



RIVER-LAND 

column of butterflies whirled up like a pillar of 
golden smoke. 

" Have a drink, children ?" inquired a but- 
terfly, fluttering around Geraldine's white 

pinafore. "The puddle is delicious this morn- 

• *> 
ing. 

" Did you come here to drink ?" asked Ger- 
aldine, incredulously. 

" Why, of course," said the butterfly ; " didn't 
you r 

" I should think not !" cried Peter. " How 
can you drink that muddy stuff when there is 
the river full of sweet, clear water ?" 

" Why, the flavor of a puddle is wonderful," 
explained the yellow butterfly. " It's full of 
all kinds of appetizing tastes. It's like the 
richest and soupiest kind of soup. IVe been 
drinking here since the rain stopped! I'm 
gorged ; and I think I'll alight on one of your 
fingers, Geraldine. Please spread them out, 
and I'll select a finger to sit on." 

9 



RIVER-LAND 

Geraldine held out her hand, slim fingers 
separated. 

" Do you take home a dish of puddle-soup 
to your children ?" asked Peter, as the butter- 
fly settled on Geraldine's middle finger and 
closed its wings. 

44 My children," said the butterfly, "have 
just hatched out. They're caterpillars now/' 

" Are they down there eating puddle-soup, 
too ?" 

" No, they're eating clover leaves in your 
clover-field/' 

"Where did they hatch? In a nest ?" in- 
quired Geraldine. 

"No. My wife laid the eggs on clover- 
stems. The eggs were not much bigger than 
the point of a pin, and they were yellow at 
first. Then they turned the brightest and 
loveliest crimson ; then the little caterpillars 
hatched, and I think they drank up all the dew 
on the stem before they began to eat. My, 

10 



RIVER-LAND 

how thirsty they were ! Then they nibbled at 
the empty egg-shells and then started in on 
the clover/' 

The butterfly opened and closed its sunny 
wings. " The caterpillars are green, striped 
with paler green," he said. "In a few weeks 
each caterpillar will turn into a pale -green 
chrysalis, you know," he added, nodding sagely. 

" How?" demanded Peter. 

"Just the way I did when I was a caterpil- 
lar. I crawled up a stem and spun a little 
button of silk on it. Then I hooked my hind 
feet into it and spun a fashionable belt of silk 
around my middle. There I hung, feet fastened, 
slung against the stem by a tiny rope of silk." 

"Lashed to the mast, like Admiral Farra- 
gut !" exclaimed Peter, with enthusiasm. 

The butterfly twitched its wings doubtfully. 
"Very likely," he said, politely. 

" And then ?" urged Geraldine. 

" Oh, I burst open — " 

1 1 



RIVER-LAND 

" Like a torpedo ! Hurrah !" cried Peter. 

" No, not like a torpedo. I burst decorous- 
ly ; it was a leisurely and dignified explo- 
sion — " 

" There was a report — a slow and dignified 
report — wasn't there ?" insisted Peter. 

" Not a sound. I silently crawled out of 
the empty chrysalis, dried my wings by pump- 
ing them full of butterfly blood and air, and 
flew away to make love. ,, 

" To make love !" exclaimed Peter, scorn- 
fully. 

"To make love !" repeated Geraldine. curi- 
ously. 

"Certainly! I'm a very, very sentimental 
butterfly. So I flitted off over the clover where 
I saw a great many yellow butterflies flying, 
and, suddenly, I espied the loveliest maiden- 
butterfly you ever saw ! Her name was 
Philodice." 

" It is a beautiful name," said Geraldine. 

12 



RIVER-LAND 

" Isn't it ?" said the yellow butterfly. "Our 
full name is Colias Philodice. You ought to 
see my wife ! She's a beauty when she's 
freshly dressed." 

" What does she wear ?" inquired Geraldine, 
softly. 

" Well, instead of the plain black borders to 
her yellow wings, which I have, she wears a 
front pair of wings delicately clouded with lu- 
minous black. Her feet and antennae are 
pink. And when I looked at her, and she 
shyly glanced at me out of nineteen or twenty 
of her beautifully jewelled eyes, I fell in love 
at first sight. Oh, Peter ! you have no idea 
what a glance from nineteen compound eyes 
can do." 

" No, I haven't !" said Peter, coldly. 

"And so you married her and lived happily 
ever after ?" suggested Geraldine, tenderly. 

"That's just exactly what I did," said the 
yellow butterfly. "And now our children are 

13 



RIVER-LAND 

growing up into fine, hardy, clover-fed cater- 
pillars, and I hope they'll hatch into butterflies 
like their mother. ,, 

" Don't they always do that ?" asked Peter. 

The butterfly walked along Geraldine's fin- 
ger, waving its wings thoughtfully. 

" Not always. Now and then it happens 
that a negro, or black butterfly, comes from the 
chrysalis of a perfectly respectable yellow but- 
terfly. Sometimes an albino, or white variety, 
appears. Sometimes" — the butterfly's voice 
trembled — "sometimes no butterfly appears." 

"Why?" asked Geraldine, awed by the yel- 
low butterfly's emotion. 

"There are," said the yellow butterfly, "sev- 
eral wicked kinds of flies called Ichneumon 
flies. These miserable creatures sometimes 
sting our caterpillars and lay little eggs in 
them, and while the poor caterpillar goes on 
eating, the egg that the Ichneumon fly laid, 
hatches, and begins to eat the caterpillar. 

14 



RIVER-LAND 

Sometimes the caterpillar dies before it changes 
to a chrysalis. But whether or not it lives as 
long as that, it never lives to become a butter- 
fly ; and out of the chrysalis, instead of a love- 
ly, soft, yellow-winged creature, crawls a sleek, 
shiny, gauze -winged and wicked -looking fly. 
Oh, my ! it gives me a shock to think of it ! 
Excuse me, children, while I revive myself on 
a proboscis full of puddle-soup. " 

As the yellow butterfly fluttered away to 
join the golden whirlwind eddying above the 
puddle, a sharp click ! click ! click ! sounded 
through the still air, and the children looked 
up quickly. 

" Did you make that noise, Peter ?" asked 
Geraldine. 

" No, I didn't," said Peter. " What in the 
world do you suppose it could have been ? 
Listen ! There it is again !" 

" Click ! click ! click !" came the sharp, dry, 
ticking notes. 

15 



RIVER-LAND 

" I saw it !" whispered Geraldine. " It was 
something yellow and brown that went drift- 
ing away into the grass. Hark !" 

" Click ! click ! click !" And a small brown- 
and-yellow winged creature came flying through 
the air, struck smartly against Geraldine's pin- 
afore, fell kicking and scrambling into the road, 
got on its six legs, and looked reproachfully at 
the children. 




II 



SINDBAD THE GRASSHOPPER 

"/^~\H, pooh ! It's only a grasshopper," said 

V>/ Peter. 

" Only a grasshopper !" cried the insect, in a 

shrill voice. "Sting me with hornets if I like 

the way you say only a grasshopper ! As if 

17 



RIVER-LAND 

grasshoppers are of no importance ! As if the 
subject of clicking grasshoppers is to be dis- 
missed with a wild pooh ! pooh !" 

" Really," began Peter, " I had no idea of 
offending you when I said 'pooh '." 

"Well, I'm glad of it, said the grasshopper, 
fiercely, turning round and round in the road. 

"How do you make that clocking noise?" 
asked Peter, curiously. 

" Noise !" retorted the grasshopper, disgust- 
ed, " that is not noise ; that is music — good 
music, too." 

The children, taken aback, were silent. The 
grasshopper walked in a stiff- legged fashion 
towards the puddle. 

" All these idiot butterflies," he muttered, 
"they can't make a sound — not a single sound. 
But I can ; and I do." 

" Are there no butterflies that make sounds ?" 
asked Geraldine, timidly. 

"That's a sensible question, and I'll answer 

18 



RIVER-LAND 

it," replied the grasshopper. " No, there are 
no butterflies that can produce sounds. There's 
a moth in England that emits a sort of mousey 
squeak when you touch it, and it's the only one 
that does/' 

"Thank you for this important information, " 
said the children, politely. 

The grasshopper, evidently pleased, took a 
short clicking flight and alighted on Geral- 
dine's thumb. " As for information," said the 
grasshopper, " I can sit here on your thumb 
and give you information until the crows fly 
home. ,, 

" Please do," said Geraldine. 

"Why, the things IVe seen would fill a 
forest, and every adventure require a tree full 
of leaves to record." 

" You mean a book full of leaves, don't you ?" 
suggested Peter. 

" Do leaves grow on books ?" inquired the 
grasshopper. 

l 9 



RIVER-LAND 

" Not on books, in books — that is, they don't 
exactly grow — " 

" In my opinion you're trying to be imperti- 
nent," said the grasshopper, angrily ; and Peter 
said nothing and turned red. 

" As I was saying," continued the grasshop- 
per, " I have seen the marvels of the world and 
have lived to return. Shall I recount a few of 
my voyages for you, Geraldine ?" 

" If you please," she said, timidly. 

"Well then," said the grasshopper, " to be- 
gin, you know, of course, that the earth is flat 
and is nearly a mile long." 

" It's round !" suggested Peter, but the grass- 
hopper turned on him so fiercely that he 
stopped short. 

" Last autumn," continued the insect, glaring 
at Peter out of his two globular eyes, "my 
mother dug a hole in the ground and laid in 
it a most talented and ambitious tgg. iy 

" Are all eggs talented ?" asked Geraldine. 

20 



RIVER-LAND 

" No, not all, only grasshoppers' eggs. Last 
May that egg hatched out into a marvel of 
beauty, courage, musical genius, and ambition — 
in short, it hatched out into a clicking grass- 
hopper." 

The insect stared hard at Geraldine, saying, 
" You recognize the description of myself, I see. 
But wait. At first I was a — " 

" Caterpillar !" said Peter, eagerly. 

" Nonsense !" retorted the grasshopper, furi- 
ous. " Do you take me for a butterfly ? Cater- 
pillars are good enough for moths and butter- 
flies but not for grasshoppers ! Permit me to 
angrily inform you that I hatched out into a 
small and graceful grasshopper, almost as per- 
fect and handsome as I now am. I lacked 
wings, but during the early summer I changed 
my skin five times, and the little wing-pads on 
my shoulders gradually developed into those 
beautiful wings which I now use to waft myself 
melodiously through the summer sunshine. " 

21 



RIVER-LAND 

The children stared. 

" I have plenty of eyes, six legs, a fine pair 
of ears tucked away at the base of my fore-legs, 
two wing-covers, two very handsome, translu- 
cent wi'ngs, a head full of lips and jaws, and a 
boundless ambition — " 

"To do what?" inquired Geraldine, gently. 

"Well," said the grasshopper, reflectively, 
" towards evening I have noticed a large, bright 
spot overhead — about as big, I should say, as 
a silver poplar leaf. I desire to be able to 
jump high enough to alight on it and find out 
what it's made of and what it's for." 

" Do you mean the moon ?" exclaimed Peter, 
and he giggled. 

" I don't know what you call it," replied the 
grasshopper, suspiciously ; " and I see nothing 
laughable in my remark." 

" Don't get angry," said Geraldine, sooth- 
ingly. "Tell us more about your ambitions." 

" One of them was to fly across the river," 

22 




THEY CALL ME SINDBAD THE GRASSHOPPER 



RIVER-LAND 

said the grasshopper, with a shudder. " I have 
made many attempts, and my hair-breadth es- 
capes from awful perils are so wonderful that 
they call me Sindbad the Grasshopper. My 
first voyage was so long ago that I can scarcely 
recall it — it was almost a week ago !" 

The insect stared solemnly at the children, 
who stared back as solemnly. 

" It happened this way," continued the grass- 
hopper : "I was sitting on a green and juicy 
stalk, eating away, and watching a cousin of 
mine eating gnats — a thing I never do. It had 
been raining that morning, and several large 
butterflies were drinking puddle-soup in the 
road, and I heard the Camberwell Beauty say 
to the Yellow Swallow-tail, that the mud across 
the river was richer and slushier and more ex- 
quisitely flavored than the mud here." 

" ' How about the grass stems/ I asked. 

" ' Oh/ said the Camberwell Beauty, waving 
her brownish purplish blue - embroidered and 

23 



RIVER-LAND 

creamy-edged wings, ' the grass over there is 
so luscious and the slush is so slushious that it 
makes my proboscis uncurl to think of it !' 

" ■ That's the place for me !' thought I. And 
as I never stop to think when I start to fly, I 
sprang into the air and went drifting and click- 
ing out over the river. It was a rash and ter- 
rific thing to do. As I flew clicking across the 
ripples a great pink and silver trout leaped 
right out of the water at me and I heard his 
jaws snap within an inch of my third pair of 
legs. Then I lost my head ; a gray-and-white 
bird made a dash at me and missed me ; I fell 
into the water and struck out frantically for 
shore." 

The grasshopper wiped its head with both 
front legs, shuddering. The children listened 
in wrapt attention. 

" I had been swimming for some seconds/' 
continued Sindbad the Grasshopper, " when I 
began to feel something softly nipping at all of 

24 



RIVER-LAND 

my six legs. And what do you think ? A 
swarm of miserable, gluttonous little minnows 
were attempting to make a breakfast off of my 
toes !" 

"What did you do ?" inquired Geraldine, 
anxiously. 

" Do, child ! I gave a tremendous kick and 
swam like fury. Then, under the water I saw 
a big, golden-scaled sunfish with scarlet and 
blue gill -covers sailing after me. Frantic, I 
scrambled madly forward, swimming for my 
life, but the sunfish darted at me and caught 
me by the hind legs, and at the same instant 
there came a splash in the water, and a big, 
brown, furry mink dived head-first at the sun- 
fish, and the sunfish in its excitement opened 
its mouth, and I, half-drowned, came floating up 
to the surface in a whirl of water and bubbles. " 

" Good gracious !" cried the children, excit- 
edly. 

" It was terrible/' said Sindbad the Grass- 

25 



RIVER-LAND 

hopper, " that first voyage of mine! I could 
go on relating to you how I swam and swam 
and kicked at nibbling minnows, how a miser- 
able cat-bird attempted to seize me and got 
her wings wet for her pains, how the fierce 
water- spiders chased me, how the malicious 
whirligigs circled round and round me trying 
to make me dizzy, how I at last managed to 
crawl upon a floating chip and how I sat there 
for an hour, while the water swept me on and 
on until a friendly alder-branch reached out 
and stopped me and I climbed up on the river- 
bank, safe and sound at last — but — " 

" But what ?" whispered the children. 

" But on the wrong side of the river !" said 
the grasshopper, sadly. " Time after time I 
have attempted to get to the other side, where 
the grass is richer and juicier, but, do you 
know, every time I reach the other side I find 
that it isn't the other side, but the other side is 
the other side ; and it's curious, isn't it ? — but 

26 



RIVER-LAND 

no matter on which side you are, there's always 
the other side, and when you get to it it isn't 
the other side any longer, but the other side 
is the other side. This," added Sindbad the 
Grasshopper, " is philosophy." 

The children were too perplexed to reply. 

" Do you know where the side that is called 
the other side is ?" inquired the grasshopper. 
" I should like to find it. The grass is much 
juicier there." 

" We don't know," said Geraldine, " we have 
never studied philosophy. But, if you please, 
would you kindly make some molasses for us 
before you go ?" 

" Molasses !" repeated the grasshopper. 
" Oh, you mean that brown liquid that comes 
out of my mouth sometimes ? I only do that 
when I'm angry, or frightened, or hurt. It 
isn't molasses, it's a liquid which I use as a 
weapon. If a big ant nips me or a tiger-beetle 
attempts to seize me, I — er — I simply spit at 

27 



RIVER-LAND 

them and they don't like it and they let me go. 
And now," continued the grasshopper, " I 
must be on my way to look for that other side 
they all talk about. I could sit here for hours 
and tell you about the wonders I have seen on 
my voyages — how I once met a fox who tried 
to eat me ; how I once saw a caterpillar that 
fed, not on leaves, as all other decent cater- 
pillars do, but on tiny, downy little insects that 
gather in herds on alder-twigs ; how sometimes 
I have seen a sort of creature that spends part 
of its life living on grasshoppers, but unless the 
grasshopper falls into the water and is eaten 
by a fish, the creature cannot become fully de- 
veloped. Oh, I could go on for hours. But 
I won't," added the grasshopper abruptly. 
"Good-bye!" 

It sprang into the air and went pitching and 
drifting off over the river; and as far as the 
children could see it they heard its clear, dry 
"Click! click! click!" 

28 



RIVER-LAND 

" I hope it reaches the other side safely," 
said Geraldine. 

" But how can it if the other side isn't the 
other side when it gets there ?" asked Peter. 

Geraldine shook her head sadly. " It's so 
very puzzling," she said. " Let's go down and 
paddle our feet ; shall we ?" 

So they joined hands and started down the 
grassy bank towards the shallow waters edge ; 
and as they reached it, and stepped out on a 
flat rock, part of the rock under their very feet 
seemed to turn into a pair of gray wings and 
go darting away across the water, and a sharp, 
keen cry broke out : " Peet ! peet ! peet ! Tip- 
up ! Tip-up ! Tip-tip-up !" 



^Jor^A/A&i ^ 



tub. 

TO 




Hi 



PETE TIP-UP 



THE children were so astonished that 
they almost toppled off the rock. 
"Goodness !" gasped Geraldine ; " do stones 



have 



wings 



T 



" It is certainly a bird just the color of a 

30 



RIVER-LAND 

stone," muttered Peter. " See ! It's wheeling 
about now. Oh, I hope it comes back to be 
friendly !" 

The bird was surely coming back, flitting 
low across the river, with curved wings bowed 
so that the tips seemed to touch the smooth 
surface of the water. And all the while its 
clear metallic cry rang out : " Peet ! peet ! peet ! 
Tip-up ! Tip-up ! Tip-tip-up !" 

As the bird neared the rock it wheeled and 
alighted at Geraldine's feet. There came a 
flash of white as it tossed its long pointed 
wings, ran across the rock, and began to bow 
and tip-up and bob in a most extraordinary 
manner. 

"You frightened me," said the bird ; " some 
of those wicked village children always throw 
pebbles at me, and my legs are so dainty and 
slender that the least blow might break them." 

"We never throw stones at beautiful birds," 
said Geraldine, quickly. 

3i 



RIVER-LAND 

"Oh, I know that !" cried the bird. "You 
are those little In-door Children, aren't you — 
Geraldine and Peter ?" 

"Yes," they said, "we are Geraldine and 
Peter. Will you please to tell us who you are 
and why you are just the color of a stone and 
why you walk around bobbing and dipping in 
that see-saw way ?" 

"Why, of course I'll tell you," replied the 
bird, pleasantly. " I have several names, you 
know. The village children call me Tip-up, 
See-saw, and Tilt-up, Teeter-tail, Peet-weet, 
Teeter, Sand-lark — oh, I've forgotten half the 
names people give me. As a matter of fact, 
my foreign name is Actitis Macularia, and my 
American name is the Spotted Sand -piper. 
My wife calls me Pete, however, so you chil- 
dren might as well call me Pete as anything." 

" Pete," said Geraldine, shyly, "why are you 
just the color of a stone ?" 

"Aha !" laughed the sand-piper, "that's the 

32 



RIVER-LAND 

joke of it. I'm so nearly the color of a stone 
that those big, sharp-eyed hawks that go sailing 
'round and 'round up there among the clouds 
can't see me. My color is my protection. 
Why, children, you have no idea how often 
I've escaped troubles of various sorts by keep- 
ing perfectly quiet on a stone or on a sandy 
shore or among withered grasses in a pasture. 
You did not see me ; you almost stepped on 
me before I darted away." 

" Are you a kind of snipe ?" asked Peter. 

"Oh, a kind of snipe — yes, but snipe fly 
differently, for one thing. Besides, snipe are 
game-birds, but no gentleman would fire at 
me. 

"Are you married? inquired Geraldine, 
gently. 

"Yes," cried the sand-piper, eagerly, "and 
my wife is the prettiest thing you ever saw ! 
She's up there, sitting on our eggs." 

"Where?" cried the children, excited. 
3 33 



RIVER-LAND 

" In the river-meadow. You see, we're nest- 
ing in a hurry because we want to bring up 
two broods this season." 

"Oh, could we see her — and the eggs?" 
pleaded Geraldine, softly; "we will be so 
very, very quiet, and we won't frighten her, we 
promise !" 

The sand - piper looked perplexed and 
scratched his sleek gray cheek with one wet 
foot. 

"Well," he said, doubtfully, "I'll take you 
over. But our nest is not much to look at — 
nothing at all elaborate, like those pretty hang- 
ing nests that the orioles weave in your elm- 
trees." 

"You can't alight in a tree, can you?" said 
Peter. 

"I ? Bless your heart, I can and I do ! It al- 
ways astonishes people, too, who never thought 
it possible for any of the snipe family to alight 
in trees. But I do it ; sometimes when my 

34 



RIVER-LAND 

wife is dozing on the nest in the grass I hop 
up on a tree or a fence, or even on the ridge- 
pole of a barn, and I sing very sweetly, ' Peet ! 
peet ! tweet !' — oh, I'm not such a bad singer. 
They call me sand-lark, too, because in the nest- 
ing season I go soaring up into the sunshine, 
singing in the manner of an English skylark — 
that is," added the sand-piper, modestly, " I 
don't, of course, sing nearly as well, but my 
wife likes it." 

" You are the dearest, friendliest little bird !" 
cried Geraldine, impulsively stooping to touch 
and smooth the silky gray wings. 

" Thanks," said the sand-piper. " I see no 
sense in sulking. Travellers like myself usu- 
ally learn to get along with people." 

" Are you a traveller ?" asked Peter, sur- 
prised. 

"Well, more or less of a traveller. IVe 
been as far north as Hudson Bay in summer, 
and as far south as Brazil in winter. In winter 

35 



RIVER-LAND 

I usually stop along anywhere south of South 
Carolina or Georgia, and often, in summer, I 
stay south of Canada." 

" And when do you build your nest?" asked 
Geraldine. 

"Oh, any time between April and Septem- 
ber. It depends on where we are. We usu- 
ally build it near rivers ; you see, we eat snails 
and worms, and one finds the juiciest and 
plumpest food near brooks and rivers." 

"And why do you tilt up and bob and bow 
all the while you are talking to us ?" asked 
Geraldine. " Is it politeness?" 

" It is probably that," said the sand-piper, 
bowing rapidly to Geraldine — ■" it is no doubt 
an inborn and instinctive mania for good man- 
ners. I bow to everybody and everything — 
to my wife, to you, to the birds who come here 
to drink, to the water, to my own reflection in 
the water — why, I even bow several times to 
the snails I am about to eat. Polished man- 

36 



RIVER-LAND 

ners please and are not difficult to acquire. 
Why not be polished while you're about it ?" 

" How true !" said the children, reverently. 

" Hereafter I shall bow to my breakfast 
every morning," said Peter. " It is good prac- 
tice to bow to every muffin and every fish-ball." 

"The best practice in the world," assented 
the sand-piper. " And now, children, if you 
care to meet my wife and inspect our domestic 
arrangements, I will lead you." 

The sand -piper spread his gray-and-white 
barred wings and flitted off in a long curve ; 
the children hastily followed, running along the 
river-bank. 

" Peet ! Peet ! Peet !" they heard the sharp, 
sweet call, and followed it out into the meadow 
until they caught a glimpse of two flashing 
wings tossed up in the sunshine. Then they 
heard another voice exclaim : " Pete ! What 
is all that noise of footsteps in the grass ?" 

"Only Peter and Geraldine, my dear," re- 

37 



RIVER-LAND 

plied the sand-piper, soothingly. "They are 
dying to see our nest and the eggs. May 

they?" 

The children stood, hand in hand, breathless 
with excitement ; for there, on the ground, 
under a bunch of tall grasses, was a little gray 
bird looking up at them, slender head raised. 
The bird's eyes were beautiful and fearless. 

"Bow to her," whispered Geraldine ; and 
the children began to bow and curtesy rapidly. 

" They are very polite children, Pete, ,, said 
his wife, rising and beginning to return the 
salutations by a series of bows and dips. 

" Oh !" cried Geraldine, enchanted. " Peter! 
Peter ! Do you see that dear little nest all 
lined with grass ? And those ivory-tinted eggs 
speckled with brown ? Oh, Mrs. Pete, it is 
the most wonderful nest I ever saw !" 

The sand-piper bowed gratefully. 

"We hope," observed Pete, " to raise a num- 
ber of children before we go south in October. 

38 




OH MRS. PETE, IT IS THE MOST WONDERFUL NEST I EVER SAW 



RIVER-LAND 

It makes quite a flock, you see, and it is much 
jollier travelling with so many than just going 
alone." 

" When the eggs hatch," said his wife, " the 
babies are certainly pretty — just little balls of 
down. And you have no idea how lively they 
are ! Why, they're no bigger than spiders, and 
they run like a flash all over the meadow and 
the river shore." 

" May we see your babies when the eggs 
hatch ?" begged the children, in raptures. 

"Yes," replied Mrs. Pete, carefully resum- 
ing her place on the nest. "Pete will let you 
know some day, won't you, dear ?" 

" With extreme pleasure," replied her polite 
husband, bowing madly to everybody. " Good- 
morning, children. It has been a great pleas- 
ure to us." 

Profoundly impressed, the children backed 
off through the meadow bowing and curtesying 
repeatedly so long as the sand-pipers were in 

39 



RIVER-LAND 

sight. And long after they had disappeared 
amid the meadow grasses the children heard a 
keen, sweet song floating from the distance, a 
faint echo of the heavenly song of a soaring 
skylark. Suddenly the song was silenced ; a 
harsh cry, something between a squealing and 
mewing, sounded from the river. 

"What's that ?" faltered Geraldine, startled, 
as a great shadow swept across the grass and 
the loud, querulous cry broke out close over- 
head. 




IV 



THE MARSH-HAWK 



T'S a hawk!" cried Peter, looking up. 

JL " Isn't he a beauty !" 

" Hear him squeal," said Geraldine. "And 
how he flies, wheeling and turning above every 
clump of bushes. See ! He's circling over 

4i 



RIVER-LAND 

the river now. Here he comes again! Oh, 
speak to him, Peter. I do want to ask him 
something/' 

The great hawk approached, gliding through 
the air just over the tops of the tall grasses and 
meadow flowers, and Peter called to him as he 
passed: "Oh, hawk, would you mind coming 
a trifle nearer ? My little sister Geraldine 
wishes to ask you something." 

The hawk soared upward, balanced on broad, 
grayish wings, and hung a moment above the 
children ; then the air fairly whistled as the 
great bird slanted and swooped. 

"Hello, Peter! How goes it, Geraldine?" 
he said, genially, alighting on the remains of an 
old stump which was almost concealed among 
sprays of elder and meadow-sweet. 

The children bowed politely to the hawk, 
who fixed on them an amused and bright-yel- 
low pair of eyes. 

He was a magnificent bird. His plumage 

42 




THE HAWK SOARED UPWARD, BALANCED ON BROAD, GRAYISH WINGS 



RIVER-LAND 

was bluish -gray and pearl -gray and silver- 
gray touched with bronze ; his curved beak 
and talons jet-black. "Did this little lady 
desire to speak to me ?" asked the hawk, with 
careless good-humor. 

" Do you mean me ?" inquired Geraldine. 

" Of course. You're a little lady, aren't 
you ? 

" I only wished to know," she said, "whether 
it was you who carried off one of our dear lit- 
tle chickens yesterday. Was it ?" 

" Nonsense!" cried the hawk, greatly amused; 
" I don't steal chickens, my child ! I'ma marsh- 
hawk." 

" And don't marsh-hawks steal chickens ?" 
asked Peter. 

The hawk shook his head and burst into a 
loud, harsh squeal, which, no doubt, is the way 
all marsh-hawks laugh. 

" No, no," he said, " I'm no chicken-thief, 
Peter. I'm no enemy to farmers. I wish the 

43 



RIVER-LAND 

farmers would get it through their heads, too, 
before they run for their shot-guns every time I 
come sailing along the river-meadows. " 

"Well, if you don't eat chickens, what do 
you eat, then ?" asked Geraldine, curiously. 

" What do I eat ? Why, I go mousing about 
over the fields for mice. I dote on mice. I 
treat myself to a frog or two, sometimes a liz- 
ard, sometimes even a grasshopper. But that 
is about the limit of my bill of fare. Mice, 
mice, toujours mice. Why, I'm the greatest 
benefit to farmers ; but they're too stupid to 
understand." 

And the hawk ruffled up all his soft feathers 
and blinked amiably at the children. 

"Are you cross-eyed?" asked Peter, sud- 
denly. 

"No," said the hawk, "but my eyes are 
pretty close together, and my beak is close to 
my eyes. Sometimes, when I realize what a 
good-looking bird I am, I try a view of my 

44 



RIVER-LAND 

own features, but all I can see is my beak, so I 
look at that. Geraldine, I wish you would tell 
me how I might spend a few hours daily look- 
ing at myself." 

"A mirror — " began Geraldine. 

"Oh yes, I know. I sit by the river and 
gaze at my exquisite features sometimes, but 
the little, soft, mushy tadpoles come wiggling 
about and the idiotic sunfish stare, and the min- 
nows gape, and I don't care for it. I'd like to 
get into some position where I could see my 
own face without looking into a mirror full of 
polliwogs." 

" My mirror isn't full of polliwogs," said 
Geraldine, laughing. 

"Then it's full of finny fishes or water- 
spiders," observed the hawk. "Oh, I know; 
you can't tell me anything about mirrors ; I've 
lived in River-land too long. Hark! Was 
that a mouse moving in the long grass ?" 

The children listened intently ; the hawk 

45 



RIVER-LAND 

bent his bright gaze on a clump of early golden- 
rod. Suddenly he pounced ; the children heard 
the snap of his polished beak, then the bird rose 
from the grass and flapped slowly back to his 
perch upon the stump again. 

" Merely a grasshopper/' he said, smacking 
his beak, reflectively — "but a rather good fla- 
vor — not bad, I assure you." 

"Oh," said Geraldine, " I hope it wasn't our 
friend Sindbad !" 

"And who, if you please, is your friend 
Sindbad ?" 

"A clicking grasshopper," said Peter. " Was 
that a clicking grasshopper you swallowed ?" 

"No," said the hawk, "it was one of those 
tender, mushy, green ones, with long whiskers 
— the kind that tune up at night and keep re- 
spectable hawks awake. That ought to teach 
him a lesson, I think." 

" But what's the good of the lesson to him 
now?" asked Geraldine. 

4 6 



RIVER-LAND 

The hawk only shook his head, mutter- 
ing, "Teach him a lesson — teach him not 
to fiddle tunes with his hind-legs when I'm 
sleepy." 

"Are you married, too?" asked Geraldine. 

" Married two ? Not much. I married 
once. Marsh-hawks only marry once in a life- 
time. And you just ought to see my wife, 
Geraldine. She's mostly bronze in color, like 
a young marsh -hawk. My gracious, what a 
figure she does cut in the sunshine when the 
sun catches her plumage !" 

" I should like to see her," said Geraldine, 
eagerly. 

" Well, she's attending to the young ones 
just now," said the hawk, "and I must confess 
that she is rather quick-tempered when nesting. 
So I don't think I'll invite you around for a 
while, if you don't mind." 

" Are the eggs already hatched ?" asked 
Peter. " What color were they ?" 

47 



RIVER-LAND 

"They were laid in May," said the hawk — 
" six of them — the most beautiful bluish-white 
eggs you ever saw. My wife and I came up 
rather early from South Carolina this spring, 
and we searched all River-land for a decent 
place to build. Finally we selected a spot on 
the overgrown pasture above the rapids, and 
we built a rather flimsy nest out of hay and 
twigs. I don't know why it is, but we marsh- 
hawks can't build decent nests." 

"Which tree is it in ?" asked Peter. 

" It isn't in a tree; it's on the ground," said 
the hawk. "You people are always getting us 
marsh-hawks mixed up with the sharp-shinned 
hawk and the red-tailed hawk, and those worst 
robbers of all, the great blue darter and the 
goshawk. They all build their nests in trees, 
all, especially the two last, are chicken-thieves 
of the deepest dye, and all of them sail and 
circle and soar high in the sky. I don't, 
neither does my wife, except when we are 

4 8 



RIVER-LAND 

courting each other. Then we rise above the 
clouds sometimes, and float and drift through 
the sunlit azure for hours/' 

The hawk scratched his head reflectively. 

"I ought to be after some of those slate- 
colored field-mice, ,, he said. "The children 
will be squealing for their dinner presently. 
Good-bye, children. Try to make a few peo- 
ple understand that we marsh - hawks, or 
mouse-hawks, or harriers, or whatever you call 
us, are not robbers, but that we rid the fields 
of mice and insects. Whenever you see a big 
hawk sailing along slowly over the tops of 
the grass — and particularly if you see a round, 
white patch of feathers on the back, you may 
be pretty sure it's only a good-natured marsh- 
hawk, and there's no need to run for the chicken- 
yard with a double-barrelled shot-gun. Good- 
bye." 

"We'll remember. Good-bye!" cried the 
children. 

49 



RIVER-LAND 

The hawk spread its broad wings and floated 
off over the meadow ; and far away the chil- 
dren heard its strange hunting-cry long after it 
was lost to sight amid the thickets of River- 
land. 




V 



IN RIVER-LAND 



THE distant cry of the marsh-hawk was 
now being industriously imitated by a 
cat-bird flitting restlessly through the willows 
along the river's leafy banks ; " Miau ! miau ! 
miau !" came the plaintive mewing ; " Meow ! 

5i 



RIVER-LAND 

meow-w !" retorted Peter and Geraldine, laugh- 
ing delightedly, until the nesting birds in the 
alders broke out into protest. 

" For goodness sake stop that noise !" cried 
a redstart, fluttering from branch to branch 
with a flash of his black -and -flame -colored 
plumage — "you'll be drawing all the hawks 
and cats and blue-jays in the neighborhood if 
you keep up that miauling !" 

"There has not been such a racket on the 
Kennyetto since the red - winged blackbirds 
left," coughed a cuckoo, exasperated. 

" I'm trembling so on my nest that I'll addle 
my eggs," wailed a small, sweet voice. " Do 
be quiet, children, and let that silly cat-bird 
alone." 

" Do you hear what the thrush says ?" piped 
a delicious voice from the top of the swamp- 
elm ; and a bird with black, white, and bright 
rose-colored plumage broke out into an ecstasy 
of musical protest. 

52 



RIVER-LAND 

Far and wide floated the lovely song of the 
grosbeak, stilling the plaintive or indignant 
murmurs of the birds ; a small bunting ruffled 
up its purple-and-sapphire plumage and com- 
posed itself to listen — a living jewel in the sun- 
shine ; the irritated Kuk ! Kuk ! Kuk ! of the 
brown-and-white cuckoo was silenced ; thrush, 
sparrow, and fire -flecked redstart subsided 
upon their nests ; the slate - gray cat - bird, 
deeply mortified, every feather adroop, sat 
quietly in the water-willows, mute as its own 
shadow. 

" They're all nesting along here," whispered 
Geraldine to Peter. " We'd better go farther 
down the river to that pool below the foot- 
bridge. " 

So they stole away along the edges of the 
flowering thickets where clumps of blue-beeches 
spread flecked shadows over the meadow — past 
the bullrush pool, where brilliant dragon-flies 
sailed on sparkling wings, through beds of mint 

53 



RIVER-LAND 

and scented bergamot, to the edge of the still 
pool below the foot-bridge. 

" Now we can paddle our feet without mak- 
ing nuisances of ourselves," cried Geraldine, 
tucking up her skirts. " Do you know, Peter, 
that whenever I'm quiet for more than a min- 
ute there's something inside of me that begins 
to laugh and sing and shout ; and then I open 
my mouth and out it comes." 

Peter lay down on the grass, and gravely 
kicked up his heels. " I wonder," he said, 
"why it is I sometimes roll around like a 
colt ?" 

" I wonder why /do," said Geraldine, doing it. 

" I wonder," said Peter, sitting up on the 
grassy river-bank and beginning to untie his 
shoes — " I wonder what all those little things 
are whirling around and around on top of the 
water. Look, Geraldine !" 

"They're whirligigs," said Geraldine, tug- 
ging at her stockings. 

54 



RIVER-LAND 

"But what are whirligigs ?" persisted Peter; 
" and why do they act like that ? Watch them, 
Geraldine; see them go darting and zigzag- 
ging and circling around like skaters on the 
lake in winter." 

"Wait, I'll catch one," said Geraldine, dip- 
ping her white feet in the water. " Goodness ! 
See how they scatter when I reach out ! Come 
back, you poor, silly, shiny whirligigs ; we're 
certainly not going to eat you !" 

"There's nothing certain about it !" retorted 
a thin and watery little voice. " Other people 
eat us ; how do we know that you won't do the 
same ?" 

"What!" exclaimed the children, horrified ; 
"who eats such a thing as a whirligig?" 

" People in Mexico," said the whirligig, 
wrathfully. "They eat our eggs, and they 
catch us, too, and feed us to their chickens." 

Peter made a wry face ; Geraldine shuddered. 

" It gratifies me," added the whirligig, " to 

55 



RIVER-LAND 

observe your indignation, and I feel reasonably 
assured that you would not attempt to eat us 
just because you know we are so delicious. " 

" Please never to mention the idea again," 
said Geraldine, faintly. And a hundred thin 
and watery but grateful little voices chorused 
their thanks. 

"What are you, anyhow?" asked Peter, curi- 
ously, as the school of whirligigs came swarm- 
ing back to the still clear pool and clustered 
together just beyond where the children's feet 
hung ankle deep in the water. 

" We won't try to catch you again/' added 
Geraldine, " because our mother has taught us 
not to make nuisances of ourselves ; but won't 
you please tell us why you all go spinning 
round and round on the water ?" 

"Why, we're chasing all kinds of tiny water 
creatures," said the whirligig. "When we 
catch them we eat them. That's why we all 
whirl around on the water." 

56 




WHY, WE RE CHASING ALL KINDS OF TINY WATER CREATURES, SAID THE WHIRLIGIG 



RIVER-LAND 

" Is the water full of live things ?" asked 
Geraldine, peering down at the bottom sands. 
" I never thought there was anything in the 
river except a few fishes/' 

" The idea !" said the whirligig, scornfully. 
"Why, the river is the most sociable and 
densely populated place in the world. Use 
your eyes, Geraldine. The top of the water is 
swarming with different kinds of gnats, flies, 
eggs, larvae, and whirligigs ; over there is a 
bunch of cousins of mine who always spin 
about on their backs, never on their stomachs ; 
and there's my big cousin Nepa, the valiant 
water-scorpion. He's a fierce fighter, I can 
tell you, and those goggle-eyed minnows over 
there had better keep an eye on him. Then, 
under the flat stones on the river-bed lurks the 
giant water-bug; and the minnows had better 
look out for him, too. Oh, there's plenty of 
company here — water -tigers that turn into 
dragon -flies, a large family named Dobson 

57 



RIVER-LAND 

that lives for three years as big, black, wrig- 
gling, biting grubs before they crawl out on 
land and turn into great, soft, lace-winged and 
double-horned flies, bigger than many dragon- 
flies. Why, the river is full of creatures, swim- 
ming on the surface, under the surface, crawl- 
ing on the bottom, burrowing through the mud. 
I'll venture to say that this river is the liveliest 
spot in the world." 

" Do you ever have terrible wars ? — hand-to- 
hand fights ?" asked Peter, hopefully. 

"Fights! Well, I should say so — it's all 
one endless and continuous fight. A saucy 
minnow comes wriggling along, slaps my cousin 
Nepa, the water-scorpion, over the head with 
its tail, and whiz ! they're at it. Ten to one 
my cousin Nepa eats the minnow, too." 

"You don't fight, I hope!" exclaimed Geral- 
dine, anxiously. 

"Oh, don't I ! I fight like mad. Look at 
me. I'm built to fight. I'm shaped like a 

58 



RIVER-LAND 

boat ; my two hind-legs are like paddles, and 
I go racing about after insects that fall into the 
water or insects that live in the water. I at- 
tack very small fish sometimes, but it's a tough 
job, although IVe a sharp beak strong enough 
to sting like a hornet. " 

" You couldn't sting us, could you ?" de- 
manded Peter, amazed. 

"Of course I could. So could my cousin 
the back-swimmer. I tell you, Peter, we're 
equipped for trouble and we're always hunting 
for it. I can dive like a fish, and when I dive 
I carry down a lot of air with me so I can 
breathe." 

" How can you carry air?" cried Geraldine. 

" The air clings to the fine hairs which cover 
my body ; watch me !" And the whirligig 
suddenly dived, swimming along under water. 

" Your body looks as though it were silver- 
plated !" exclaimed Peter. 

"That's the air I carry," said the whirligig, 

59 



RIVER-LAND 

coming to the surface and darting and gyrating 
about between the children's feet; "that glis- 
tening silvery film along my legs and stomach 
is nothing but air ; and I carry it down and 
breathe it through little holes called spiracles 
in my sides and thighs. " 

" Is there anything else you can do ?" asked 
Peter, respectfully. 

"Certainly. I can crawl about on land. I 
can fly like a beetle — I have wings folded up 
under these shiny, polished wing-covers. Often 
I leave the river at night after a shower and 
go flying off to find some puddle where there 
ought to be food. Then I spin around on the 
surface of the puddle until the puddle dries 
up ; then I crawl out, spread my wings, and 
fly off to a new place. " 

"I had no idea," exclaimed Peter, "that a 
whirligig could do all these things !" 

"All whirligigs can," said the insect, proud- 
ly, " and there are some thirty or forty different 

60 



RIVER-LAND 

kinds whose first names are like mine — Corixa. 
You can call me whirligig, water -boatman, 
pond-skipper, or whatever you like, but my real 
name is Corixa, if anybody should make kind 
inquiries. " 

" There's one thing you can't do," said Peter, 
thoughtfully. 

" What's that ?" demanded the whirligig. 

"You can't sing !" 

"Oh yes, I can," retorted the insect, jaunti- 
ly. " Listen." 

The whirligig began to strike its horny 
nose with both front feet ; at first the children 
heard nothing, then, gradually stealing on the 
ear, a clear note grew, sounding louder and 
louder. 

"That isn't very bad, is it?" asked the 
whirligig. 

" It's rather pretty," said Geraldine, politely. 

The insect whirled round and round several 
times in triumph. 

61 



RIVER-LAND 

" What do you do when winter comes ?" in- 
quired Peter. 

"We dive down and burrow into the mud 
under the water. When spring comes we 
crawl out again, swim up to the top, and begin 
to look for a new crop of trouble. " 

" Don't you ever do anything but eat and 
fight ?" asked Geraldine. 

"We lay eggs," replied the whirligig — 
" bunches of eggs attached to the stems of 
water plants. Those cousins of mine, who 
spend their lives swimming on their backs, lay 
their eggs inside the stems of water plants ; so 
do the water-scorpions. But my other relative, 
the giant water-bug, has an awful time with 
eggs." 

" How?" asked the children. 

"Why, you see, his wife is bigger and 
stronger than he is, and she's a very advanced 
and determined female — full of modern notions 
about the care of children. So when sheV 

62 



RIVER-LAND 

ready to lay a bunch of eggs she seizes on her 
amazed husband, and, spite of his frantic strug- 
gles, she lays the eggs all over him !" 

" But what becomes of him?" cried the be- 
wildered children. 

"He becomes nothing but a walking incu- 
bator, and mopes about weighted down with a 
load of eggs, while his wife goes gadding about. 
Isn't it awful? I tell you I'll think several 
times before I marry." And the whirligig 
went circling and zigzagging off among the 
shiny swarm that whirled over the placid sur- 
face of the pool. 

" I don't think I should ever marry if I were 
a water-bug," observed Peter, paddling his feet 
in the cool, clear water. 

" If I were a water-bug," reflected Geraldine, 
" I should marry, I think — but I should never, 
never be cruel enough to lay eggs all over my 
husband." 

There was a silence broken by an exclama- 

63 



RIVER-LAND 

tion from Peter: " If that mosquito comes hum- 
ming around me again, I'll defend myself !" 

"You wouldn't kill it !" cried Geraldine, re- 
proachfully. " Have you forgotten what we 
have learned about destroying life that we can- 
not replace ?" 

"That's silly !" snapped the mink, poking its 
furry muzzle out of a cleft in the rocks oppo- 
site. " It is the business of Indoor people to 
destroy every house-fly and every mosquito 
they can." 

"Why?" asked the children, astonished. 

" Because they carry sickness in their miser- 
able bodies," said the mink, sharply. 

"I can't help it," said Geraldine; "it is 
wicked to destroy anything alive." 

"Then why do you take medicine when you 
have a cold, or when you have measles or 
mumps or whooping-cough ?" demanded the 
mink. 

" Medicine !" repeated Geraldine ; " what 

64 



RIVER-LAND 

harm clo I do by taking medicine ? I don't 
kill anything, do I ?" 

"Indeed, you do ; you kill millions and mill- 
ions of tiny live creatures when you swallow 
medicine. " 

" Where are they ?" 

"In your body, child. Sickness is caused 
by millions of living things, so small that only 
a most powerful microscope can show them. 
While they are alive and increasing in your 
blood, you are ill and you grow worse ; as soon 
as you take the sort of medicine that kills them 
you are better ; and you get well when the 
medicine has killed them all." 

" Good gracious ! We didn't know that !" 
exclaimed the children. 

" It's so," squeaked the mink. " And what's 
the difference between whacking a mosquito or 
a house-fly, both of which are full of these little 
living things that will make you ill, and pour- 
ing several doses of medicine into your stomachs 

65 



RIVER-LAND 

after the mosquito or the house-fly have alighted 
on you and spread the little creatures that make 
sickness all through your skin and blood ?" 
"After this," said Peter, wrathfully, "I shall 

whack every mosquito and every house-fly that 

I" 
see. 

" It is silly not to," said the mink. " It is 
nothing but a proper precaution. Now, for 
instance, it would be cruel to destroy a bee or 
a wasp just because they sting. It is your 
business to leave them alone. All creatures 
defend themselves when attacked, and it is 
your business not to attack. But you are al- 
ways right in defending yourselves ; therefore, 
common-sense bids you defend yourselves al- 
ways against disease-laden mosquitoes and that 
most filthy of insects, the common house-fly." 

"Tee-e! he-e ! tee-e ! he-el" sang a tiny, 
thin, malicious voice, vibrating in Peter s ear. 
"Tee-e! Z-z-z-z ! Let old furry-muzzle talk! 
What do I care? I'll bite him, too, if I catch 

66 



RIVER-LAND 

him asleep on a sunny log. I'll bite everybody 
and everything !" 

" Whack !" came Peter's hand ; but the mos- 
quito sailed off over the stream, hung above 
the water for a while to tantalize the hungry 
minnows, then drifted like a winged mote to 
a willow twig bending above the stream and 
alighted on a leaf, head down, hind-legs stick- 
ing straight up in the air. 




VI 



THE OUTLAW 



BELIEVE that mosquito is laughing at 
JL me !" said Peter, indignantly. 
" I am," hummed the mosquito. " Z-z-z ! 
I nearly bit you that time, Peter. Look out or 
I'll bite you yet !" 

68 



RIVER-LAND 

" In all Outdoor-land, " said Geraldine, sor- 
rowfully, "you are the only really wicked creat- 
ure that we have met." 

" Wicked ? Of course I'm wicked," sang the 
mosquito, gleefully. "Am I not an outlaw? 
Is not every Indoor hand against me? And 
every Outdoor creature fears and hates me ; 
horses and cattle lash at me with their legs 
and tails, lesser beasts snap at me or try to 
roll over on me and flatten me out, birds and 
insects eat me, the fish lie low under the sur- 
face waiting for me to lay my eggs. Ha ! ha ! 
Who cares ? Fma fierce freebooter, and whole 
nations tremble and take counsel together how 
they may resist me. I lie hidden, waiting for 
live things ; I terrify, I rule, I close entire 
regions to civilization. It's a merry life while 
it lasts ! Z-z-z !" 

"Then," said Peter, slowly, "you are what 
is called a public enemy." 

" Exactly," said the mosquito; "my stinging 

6 9 



RIVER-LAND 

apparatus is against every one and everything 
— even juicy stems and succulent flowers I 
pierce, sucking their veins." 

"Is their nothing good about you?" asked 
Geraldine, in despair. 

" I have not one single redeeming trait," re- 
plied the mosquito, proudly. " Even a house- 
fly has a shadow of an excuse for his sins, but I 
have none. Why, as a matter of fact, you know 
I can live just as well as not without feeding 
on Indoor people. I was born to the simple 
nourishment of the moisture and juices found 
in succulent stems and leaves." 

" And yet you deliberately annoy live creat- 
ures !" said Peter. 

" Deliberately, persistently — Z-z-z !" 

" Have you no wife to influence you for the 
better ?" asked Geraldine, almost in tears. 

"Wife? No, but I have a husband who 
doesn't amount to much," replied the mos- 
quito, tartly. 

70 



*v#; 



?M- 



w 



■ m 



m 



*r 



<-> 







ARE THERE ANY HARMLESS MOSQUITOES?' ASKED PETER, QUIETLY 



RIVER-LAND 

The horrified children were silent. 

u He never bites anything, you know; he 
sips a little moisture now and then, I fancy, 
yet, as a matter of fact, I never saw him feed 
at all. But I feed !" added the mosquito, vi- 
ciously. 

" Are there any harmless mosquitoes ?" asked 
Peter, quietly. " I only want to know so that 
I may spare them in battle/' 

" Well/' said the mosquito, carelessly, "there 
are five families of mosquitoes in this country, 
and of these five the Anopheles family is the 
worst. There are three kinds of Anopheles 
mosquitoes. This is the way they give you 
malaria: A mosquito bites an Indoor person 
who has malaria ; the tiny malarial creatures 
are sucked in by the mosquito, and inside the 
mosquito they immediately begin to breed. 
Then the next Indoor person whom the mos- 
quito stings is sure to get a big dose of those 
malarial creatures in his blood, and he becomes 

7i 



RIVER-LAND 

ill. Simple, isn't it? — simple, but effective. 
Z-z-z !" 

The children stared in speechless indignation. 

" The Anopheles mosquito usually rests with 
his head and body at right angles to whatever 
he is standing on. In other words, he stands 
on his head," continued the mosquito. 

"Why," said Peter, hoarsely. 

"Why not?" asked the mosquito. 

" Heads were not made to stand on," said 
Peter. 

" Matter of opinion," observed the mosquito. 
" Now, for example, what do you use your ears 
for?" 

" To hear with, of course." 

"Well," remarked the mosquito, "when I'm 
still in a wingless state I use my ears to breathe 
through. It's purely a matter of taste and opin- 
ion, you see." 

" Don't you always have wings ?" demanded 
Peter. 



RIVER-LAND 

" No. First, I'm a single tiny tgg floating 
amid a flat mass of other eggs on the water. 
In sixteen hours I'ma larva — what you children 
call a 'wiggler' — youVe often seen wigglers 
wriggling and jerking about in stagnant water 
standing in old troughs or barrels or "kettles." 

" I wish I'd known what wigglers were 
when I saw them in the rain-water barrel," said 
Peter, darkly. 

The mosquito laughed and went on : " Seven 
days we wriggle as wigglers, coming up to the 
surface to breathe every now and then, and 
eating our fill of food so small that you could 
not even see it. Then we turn into pupas and 
float for two days more before we burst our 
shells and dry our wings and go sailing away 
on a biting expedition, full-fledged outlaws ! 
Z-z-z !" 

"Anyhow," said Peter, drawing a long breath, 
"winter will do what my hand failed to do." 

" Not much," said the mosquito, gleefully. 

73 



RIVER-LAND 

" I can hide away in some warm nook when 
the snow flies, and come out fresh and naughty 
as ever in the spring. Listen next May and 
you'll hear my cheery hum — not high-pitched, 
like my cousin Culex, but low in tone. Don't 
worry about me, children. I can look out for 
Anopheles number one — " 

"Snap!" A small gray bird hung hovering 
in the air, darting its head from side to side. 

"Where's that mosquito?" cried the little 
gray flycatcher, excitedly. " I snapped, but 
missed. Where is that mosquito ?" 

The children were silent. They saw the 
wicked Anopheles flying away as fast as its 
wings could work, but they were fair-minded 
children, who never told tales. Besides, three 
against one was not fair, even though the one 
was a sinner like the outlaw mosquito. 

" Did you hear my bill snap ?" asked the lit- 
tle flycatcher, settling on a twig and looking 
carefully around for the mosquito. 

74 



RIVER-LAND 

" I should think we did !" began Ger- 
aldine. " I had no idea such a tiny bird 
could be so noisy. Oh, please wait a mo- 
ment — " 

But the bird darted off like a flash, calling, 
" There's the mosquito! Excuse my haste, 
children !" and in another moment the clear, 
dry snap of its bill sounded from the thicket on 
the other side of the river. But whether or 
not the little gray flycatcher caught the wicked 
mosquito that time the children never knew, 
because neither the mosquito nor the bird came 
back to tell them. 

" Did you ever, ever believe that any live 
thing in Outdoor-land could be as horrid as 
that mosquito ?" asked Geraldine, sadly. " And 
the flies, too — the cosey, cheery, buzzy little 
house-flies — did you believe they were full of 
dreadful germs ? I suppose we'll have to whack 
them now." 

"The way to do," said Peter, "is to have 

75 



RIVER-LAND 

screens. Then they can't come into the house, 
and then, you see, we won't ever be obliged to 
destroy any living thing !" 

"That's the best way!" cried Geraldine, 
cheering up immediately. " I couldn't bear 
the idea of harming anything." 

" But, of course, we must be brave enough 
to do our duty and whack any fly that gets in," 
said Peter. 

" Ye-s," said Geraldine, "but please do my 
part for me — won't you, Peter ?" 

Peter nodded, splashing his legs thoughtfully 
in the water. 

" I shall miss the flies," he murmured. 
"They're good company when mademoiselle 
reads to-morrow's lesson through for us in ad- 
vance. And they most always sit on her nose, 
and then she slaps at them and her glasses fall 
off—" 

" Mother says we must try not to see any- 
thing funny in that," said Geraldine. 

7 6 



RIVER-LAND 

" I didn't say it was funny," retorted Peter ; 
" I only said I should miss the flies. Once 
mademoiselle found me making a fly-cage out 
of a leaf from your copy-book; and do you 
know what she did ? She made me write a 
verse in French about flies. " 

" Did you ?" giggled Geraldine. 

" I had to." 

" What did you write ?" 

" I wrote : 

" ' Une mouche 

Dans la bouche 
N'est pas tres commode; 

C'est louche, 

Cest— ' 

and I couldn't find any rhyme but 'touche/ 
and that made no sense, and there seemed to 
be no sense in anything that rhymed with 
' commode/ so that's all I did ; and mademoi- 
selle wanted to know where I had heard the 
word 'louche/ and I told her I heard mothers 

77 



RIVER-LAND 

maid say it about some friend of hers, and 
that's all that happened/' 

"That was enough/' mused Geraldine, 
watching the little minnows swimming against 
the slow current. " I adore poetry, but not that 
kind you made. Ugh ! N'en parlons plus, tu 
sais — " And she shrugged her shoulders and 
shook her curly head in dainty disgust. 

Long, bluish shadows were lying across the 
meadow now ; the sun hung low over the sap- 
phire hills, and the sunlight was tinted with a 
deeper glow where it slanted through the trees 
of River-land. 

Bird after bird began to sing, orioles fluting 
from maple and elm, bobolinks carolling ecstati- 
cally as they hovered over the wet meadow ; the 
heavenly note of a hermit-thrush floated faintly 
from the hill -side pines, and, high on the tip 
of a tall balm-of-Gilead, a rosy grosbeak poured 
forth its lovely melody, echoed far away by the 
sweet, minor calling of the white-throat. 

78 



RIVER-LAND 

River-land was astir ; in the mill-pond above 
the swinging bridge pickerel were leaping into 
the air — splash! splash! Old mother musk- 
rat, with her sleek mouth full of juicy stems 
and grasses, came silently swimming down- 
stream, steering along without a sound, now 
in the middle, now close under the overhanging 
banks. Turtle after turtle left a floating water- 
soaked log under the dam and swam off shore- 
ward. 

In the golden bands of sunlight that slanted 
across the stream clouds of gnats danced aerial 
jigs, unmindful of the pretty cherry-birds in 
their silken drab-and-yellow-barred plumage, 
who came silently hovering over the river to 
snap at the dizzy dancers. 

" Look ! What is this flying up the river?" 
whispered Geraldine, tugging at Peters sleeve. 

Whirring along low over the calm surface of 
the water came a heavy bird, neck outstretched, 
stocky little wings fanning the air so rapidly 

79 



RIVER-LAND 

that, as it neared the children, the whistling, 
whimpering sound of its wings increased to a 
shrill whish-h-h ! The bird struck the water 
close to their feet, splashed about for a mo- 
ment, sousing head and wings in the stream, 
wagged its tail, ducked its head again and 
again, and, flinging a rainbow of tinted spray 
from wing and crest, glanced up demurely at 
the children, saying: " Good -evening, Geral- 
dine ! Good -evening, Peter! What do you 
think of my new summer plumage ?" 









* &30 




VII 



THE WOOD-DUCK 



NEVER, in all their lives, had the chil- 
dren seen such an exquisitely beautiful 
bird. Its crested head flashed with every color 
of the rainbow ; the bill was pink and orange, 
the eye crimson, the legs yellow, the breast 

8/ 



RIVER-LAND 

a rich mahogany dotted with snowy white. 
Purple and green lights played over its folded 
wings ; its head was all tufted with gold and 
green enamelled feathers glossed with irides- 
cent azure. 

" Are you a parrot ?" stammered Peter, 
breathing deeply in his excitement. 

" Why, no, you silly child ; I'm a wood-duck. 
Don't you remember last autumn, when your 
father wouldn't let old Pkelim shoot at a little 
flock of ducks on the river, because he said 
that nobody with a shred of decency would 
kill a wood-duck ?" 

"But those ducks were gray and brown/' 
said Peter, "and you're every beautiful color 
that I ever dreamed of!" 

"That's because I have on my summer 
clothes — my bridal plumage," said the duck, 
with a soft, twittering chuckle. " But I'm a 
wood-duck, just the same, and I was out there 
on the river with my wife and children, just 

82 



RIVER-LAND 

ready to travel to Florida, when I saw old 
Phelim dodging behind the trees with his gun, 
and I heard what your father said about wood- 
ducks. And that," added the wood-duck, con- 
fidently, " is why I am so fearless and why I 
came down almost under your feet to splash 
and bathe and dive and swim and chase gnats 
and whirligigs for an hour before sunset." 

The bird shook out its long, hooded crest 
and stretched its silvery throat, snapping lazily 
at a passing gnat. 

" Never, never," breathed Geraldine, en- 
raptured, " could I imagine a more magnifi- 
cent creature than you. Surely you came 
straight from fairy-land !" 

" No, I came from Cranberry Creek," said 
the wood -duck, a trifle amused. "This is 
rather a long evening flight for me, especially 
while my wife is nesting ; but I heard the big 
marsh-hawk telling the great blue heron that 
you children were paying a visit to River-land, 

83 



RIVER-LAND 

so, in compliment to your father, I took this 
opportunity to pay you our respects." 

" Did you really come over from Cranberry 
Creek to visit us ?" cried Geraldine, delighted. 

" I certainly did," replied the beautiful wood- 
duck, floating on the still pond, crimson eyes 
half closed. 

" I can scarcely believe that you are a duck," 
murmured Geraldine. "We have ducks, you 
know, all white, with orange-colored bills, that 
waddle and waddle and quack all day. Can 
it be possible that a heavenly bird like you 
quacks ?" 

" No," replied the wood-duck, with its gentle, 
musical laughter. " I don't quack — in fact, I 
can't quack. No wood-duck can. But I have 
a rather sweet call at nesting- time. Wood- 
ducks are not like any other ducks in the world. 
Did you ever hear of a duck that could fly up 
into a tree and walk about the branches as 
comfortably as any blackbird ?" 

8 4 



RIVER-LAND 

" Can you ?" asked Peter, astonished. 

"All wood-ducks can," laughed the bird. 
" More than that, we build our nests in trees." 

" A duck's nest in a tree !" cried Peter, 
amazed. 

" Certainly. Sometimes we use a hollow 
tree where an owl or a squirrel has nested, 
sometimes we use an old birds' nest in a crotch, 
and sometimes we make a new nest in the forks 
of the branch — a big nest, not very well built, 
but warmly lined with dried grass and feathers. 
In that nest my wife places the eggs. There 
are usually ten, sometimes fewer, sometimes a 
bakers dozen or more ; and they are the pretti- 
est little pale-creamy eggs you ever looked at." 

" But," said Geraldine, perplexed, "when 
your little ducklings hatch, how do they get 
down from the tree to the river ?" 

"Sometimes, when the nest is on a branch 
overhanging the stream, my wife just coaxes 
them to the edge of the nest and then shoves 

85 



RIVER-LAND 

them overboard with her bill. But if the tree 
is inland in a swamp or among dry timber 
cover, my wife carries the children, one by one, 
to the stream. They don't weigh much — they're 
just little puffs of fluff; but you ought to see 
them swim ! Why, the moment they feel the 
water they go darting out over the surface as 
nimbly as whirligigs." 

" Did you teach them to swim ?" asked Peter. 
"Father taught Geraldine and me/' 

" Ducklings don't have to learn ; they just 
know," said the wood-duck. u We wood-ducks 
are experts in the water. We can catch one 
of those lightning whirligigs as easily as we 
pick up a beechnut or an acorn or a plump 
white grub in the forest. And there's an- 
other matter I wish to mention, children. We 
wood - ducks are easily tamed if we're not 
shot at. Year after year we come back to 
the same tree to nest ; we are fearless and 
friendly if nobody attempts to harm us — so 

86 




"we wood-ducks are experts in the water 



RIVER-LAND 

friendly that we often alight in people's duck- 
ponds and even follow the waddling domestic 
flock up into the very poultry -yard. Why, 
even in the limits of New York City we still 
nest ; and if I were certain that these whirli- 
gigs would not tell the rattle-pate kingfisher, 
and that the kingfisher would not gabble the 
secret up and down the entire river, I could 
tell you exactly where some cousins of mine 
have nested for years, and still nest, within the 
city boundary of Greater New York/' 

" Dear me ! — goodness me !" sighed Geral- 
dine ; "how could anybody be so cruel as to 
fire a gun at you ?" 

" They do, all the same," said the wood- 
duck, shaking its jewelled head solemnly. 
"Why, only last February I had a narrow 
escape in the Florida flatwoods when one 
morning, just at daylight, some quail-hunters 
shot at me as I dashed through the trees 
towards a cypress - swamp. Guns are bad 

S7 



RIVER-LAND 

enough, " continued the wood-duck, scratching 
its golden cheek with its yellow toe and preen- 
ing its chocolate - brown - and - white - dotted 
breast — "bad enough in their way. But down 
there in Florida a wood-duck must keep his 
eyes open every second/' 

"What else is there to harm you ?" asked 
Geraldine, anxiously. 

"Snakes, my child; alligators, crocodiles, 
hawks, great fierce fish in the lagoons, and in 
the jungle there are wildcats that make no 
noise when they walk along the branches. 
Here in the North the hawks are always 
watching for us ; so are the foxes. Don't you 
think we wood-ducks have a hard enough time 
without dodging the guns of Indoor folk ?" 

" Indeed we do !" cried the children, full of 
sympathy. 

"We do no harm, ,, said the wood-duck ; 
"we eat wild rice and other seeds when we're 
on shore ; in the water we grub up the tender 

88 

WLofC. 



RIVER-LAND 

roots of water-plants, and we eat insects. It is 
true we are fond of beechnuts and acorns, but 
there are plenty of these for everybody, includ- 
ing small boys and wood-ducks. Besides, we 
don't go in big flocks ; we travel south with 
our children and come north in March and 
April all alone." 

" But why in the world do people try to 
shoot you ?" asked Peter. 

" Because we are, I understand, very good 
to eat," said the wood-duck, chuckling. "It 
enrages the mallards and the canvas -backs 
when we tell them that we are quite as good 
to eat as they are. And it's so — in fact, any 
duck that doesn't eat fish is good to eat. 
When canvas-backs eat fish nobody can endure 
their flavor ; and if a black duck or a red-head 
confines itself to a diet of wild rice and buck- 
wheat, nobody could tell the difference between 
them and a rice-fed canvas-back." 

"I shouldn't think you would care to talk 

8 9 



RIVER-LAND 

about how you tasted to other people, " said 
Geraldine ? with a shudder. 

"Oh, we don't worry about anything/' said 
the duck, carelessly. " It's rather a matter of 
pride with us that we really are as good to eat 
as those flat-headed, bull-necked, blue-footed 
canvas -backs, who are always boasting about 
their position in the most exclusive society. 
If I'm to be shot and eaten, at least it will be 
a comfort to me, as I lie in the platter all trick- 
ling with delicious gravy, to know that there is 
not a duck in the world which is better worth 
cooking than I am." 

The wood -duck rose upright in the water 
and whipped the air with its splendid 
wings. 

" My wife will be anxious to hear all about 
you," he said, "so I must say good-night, chil- 
dren." 

" Give her our love !" cried the children, as 
the duck darted up with a whispering whir, 

90 



RIVER-LAND 

circled once in the sunset glow above the trees, 
then turned due north, winging away so swiftly 
that in a second or two it had dwindled to a 
dark dot in the evening sky. 

For a while the children sat in silence, dry- 
ing their feet in Peters fresh handkerchief. 
Then they slowly drew on their shoes and 
stockings. The sun was dipping so low be- 
hind the purple Mayfield hills that only one 
glowing edge remained like a rim of fire against 
the sky. And, as they looked, it vanished, and 
the low hills turned a darker blue, and the sky 
overhead grew pink and gold. 

" Go to bed ! go to bed ! go to bed !" croaked 
a surly old bull-frog from the reeds. "Scoot! 
scoot ! scoot !" hooted an owl from the darken- 
ing alders. " Good-bye ! good-bye !" wailed the 
phoebe-bird from the old foot-bridge, as the 
children joined hands and moved slowly away 
through the meadow. 

Dusk fell over river and thicket ; against the 

9 1 



RIVER-LAND 

deepening sky the trees in the orchard stood 
out clear and dark. 

" Come again ! come again !" whispered the 
little gray moths swarming around them through 
the tall grasses. 

"We promise, ,, murmured the children. 
"Good-night, little moths/' 

When at last they reached the hill -top, 
Geraldine stopped, laying her hand on Peter's 
shoulder. 

"Hark!" she said; "something is singing 
down there in the dark." 

They listened, heads turned ; and far away, 
stealing out of the velvet dusk, they heard the 
voice of the stream singing the faint, sweet 
songs of River-land. 



THE END 



SEP 22 1904 




1 



CM 



^**S*S- 





